14. School trip to the forest
One day in early summer, there was a fresh and pleasant breeze stirring the air.
Lucinda and Mia were walking together in the forest.
Today was the first day of their school trip. They were going to spend three days and two nights with their classmates at a wooden hut in the middle of a vast forest in the mountains.
All students, divided into groups of four, were now on their way to the mountain hut. Lucinda’s group consisted of her, Mia, Lyle, and Samuel.
Samuel and Lucinda hadn’t talked much in the past, but now that they were in the same group, they spoke twice.
Samuel was a slender boy with glasses who looked a little uptight. However, he seemed to like insects, and on the way to the house, when he found an insect, he approached it and shouted happily.
Lucinda, who hated insects, was watching Samuel’s behavior with a blank stare when Mia started to talk to her in an excited tone.
“This trip to the woods is just like in the original story. It has a lot of good events! Don’t mind me and just interact with everyone.”
The “everyone” she referred to was, needless to say, Aaron, Lyle, and Ray.
It seems that Mia was always preoccupied with her otome game events. Once again, she seemed to be hiding things like she did during the exam period. Mia even went as far as to prepare a hidden camera like the one she did for the exam, but Lucinda refused and managed to get her to give up this time.
At the time, Lucinda was easily convinced to go along with Mia’s wishes. But thanks to that, she ended up giving Mia something to fantasize about, which made things difficult later on. Lucinda couldn’t afford to make the same mistake this time.
“I’m just going to act normal. I’m not going to do what you want!”
“Oh, it’s torture not to be able to take a video of the evening event. Fine, I’ll give up for your sake, Lucinda, so at least tell me what happens! You absolutely have to!”
“Eh…Okay, I understand…”
Under Mia’s tremendous pressure, Lucinda ended up making a promise to report on whatever event was going to happen that evening.
◇◇◇
After about thirty minutes of walking along the mountain road, they finally arrived at the mountain hut.
Lucinda thought there would be some time to rest, but as soon as she put her luggage in her room, they were immediately called to gather in the open space outside. For a school attended by royalty and the aristocracy, they were surprisingly unforgiving.
Moreover, each group was scheduled to make soup for lunch on the first day, and apparently, they were going to start making soup right away.
“Hey, isn’t it strange that aristocrats are making soup on a school trip?”
Puzzled, Lucinda asked Mia if she thought that it was normal. To which Mia replied, as if it were nothing,
“It’s the world of an otome game. There are always things that happen for the sake of the plot.”
“Was there a soup-cooking event in the original?”
“Yes, there was. The combination of ingredients changes the score of deliciousness, and the cooking is a rhythm game of knife handling and adjusting the heat.”
“What, it’s an otome game? Are you sure it isn’t a Kusuge*?” (TL: Shitty game)
“That’s rude. It was a popular game with great characters and voices.”
‘If the characters and voices are the only things that are great, then the rest of the game must have been unpopular,’ Lucinda thought to herself, but she decided not to voice her opinions aloud.
And so, while chatting with Mia, she selected the vegetables for the soup and was about to prepare them when….
“Umm, Mia, aren’t you holding the knife wrong……?”
For some reason, Mia glared at the potatoes on the chopping board while holding the knife backhanded. When Lucinda called out to Mia, who looked like she was about to stab the poor potatoes to death, Mia put down her knife with a strange look on her face.
“I’m sorry about that. To be honest, I can’t cook in real life even though I killed it in the cooking event and got a perfect score.”
“I see. I used to help with the housework in my previous life, so I can at least make soup. Mia, you can just do the tasting and cleaning up.”
In the first place, it was normal for nobles not to be able to cook. When Lucinda offered to do the cooking, Mia thanked her with a relieved look.
“Thank you. I’m good at tasting, so leave it to me!”
“I’ll be counting on you.”
While Lucinda was happily preparing the food with Mia cheering her on, Lyle and Samuel were chopping wood to start a fire. From a distance, it looked like Lyle was doing most of the work.
“Lyle and Samuel, thanks for your hard work!”
Lucinda thanked the two of them for their labor. She called them both by their first names without honorifics since Lyle said to stop using them since they were part of the same team this time.
“It’s no big deal. Thank you for doing the cooking for us.”
Lyle replied with a relaxed face, barely even sweating. It appeared that he was able to start the fire without trouble.
“I’m going to use the fire now.”
Lucinda checked the heat and placed the pot on the fire.
She heated olive oil in the pan and sauteed the minced garlic. As soon as the appetizing aroma began to appear, she added sliced bacon. There was a pleasant sizzling sound, and she could smell the meat cooking.
“Wow, it already looks delicious at this point!”
She laughed at Mia, who inhaled the aroma deeply, and continued to add chopped onions to the pot. Lucinda gave the cooking ingredients a quick stir with a wooden spatula, sprinkled salt and pepper on, and then sauteed some more, being careful not to burn the food.
When the onions started to look translucent, she added finely chopped potatoes, carrots, and cabbage, sprinkled a little more salt, and lightly sauteed them again. After the cabbage had softened a bit, Lucinda added water, covered the pot with a lid, and let it simmer until the vegetables were cooked through.
When the vegetables were fully cooked, she added a little more salt and pepper to taste.
“I think that’s it. Mia, can you taste it?”
“Sure! Hmmm, let’s see.”
Mia scooped a spoonful from the pot, blew on it to cool it down, and slowly brought it to her mouth.
“It’s delicious!”
Mia exclaimed. It seems that the seasoning was okay.
“How did you make this? It’s so good, let’s eat it quickly!”
“Really? Let’s serve it quickly, then.”
Lucinda ladled the soup into everyone’s bowls quickly, and Mia placed a piece of bread for each person on a plate. The bread had been prepared in advance by the facility. Although it was a little hard, it seemed to be just right to eat together with the soup.
After preparing the table, everyone started eating together.
The first thing everyone tried was, of course, the piping hot soup. Lyle and Samuel, whose taste buds had been tempted by the sight of Mia tasting the soup, couldn’t wait to put their spoons in their mouths.
“…………delicious.”
Lucinda’s face broke into a smile when she heard Lyle and Samuel’s voices praising the food.
“Is it delicious? Good~!”
“The taste of the bacon and vegetables is really good. I also saw you making it, so you must be a good cook.”
“I’m not that good at it, but I’ve cooked before. It seemed that it suits everyone’s palate, so it was worth the effort.”
Lyle and Mia both praised the taste of the soup, and Samuel seemed to like the taste, as he kept quietly sipping the soup, although he didn’t participate in the conversation.
As they were enjoying their lunch peacefully, Ray came to check on them.
“Is the soup done?”
“Mr. Ray! You look a little pale, are you okay?”
Mia asked with concern.
“Yeah, no problem. Oh my goodness, your soup smells so good.”
“Doesn’t it? Lucinda’s special soup is really delicious. Would you like some, teacher?”
“Is that okay? Then, can I have some?”
She served a bowl of soup to Ray, who immediately took a sip, and then continued to finish the whole plate in a flash. His complexion seemed to be better than before.
“Aaah, that was delicious. My tongue has been brought back to life.”
“What, your tongue has been dead all this time?”
“Yeah, I had to taste the other team’s soup. It was a little, well……”
“Did it taste that bad?”
“The vegetables in Aaron’s group were raw and the whole soup just smelled like celery. The other group seemed to have blueberries mixed in for some reason, and it tasted and looked like hell…”
Mia and Lyle gave Ray a sympathetic look as he spoke with a distant look in his eyes.
“Our soup is definitely the best. I’m glad I’m in a group with you.”
“Lucinda, thank you for protecting our tongues.”
Until the meal ended, Lucinda’s group was the subject of many envious glances from the other
students.
Note:
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ED:Ali
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